RAPID: Long-term Unemployment and Individualist Values

本研究的重点是个人体验对核心价值观的影响。核心价值观被认为提供了一个稳定的基础，有力地影响了人们对公共政策的态度。价值观，如个人主义和平等，被认为是在生命的早期就决定的，仍然相对抵制变化。然而，一个重要的问题是，当人们的个人经历挑战这些价值观的核心信念时，他们的价值观是否会发生变化。这个项目的学术价值集中在这样一个论点上，即对许多人有重大影响的共同经历可以影响人们的核心信念以及从这些信念中衍生出来的价值观。近期的经济衰退是大萧条以来持续时间最长的一次，伴随高失业率而来的是失业超过六个月的高比例人群。2010年4月，劳工统计局报告称，超过48.1%的失业者失业超过6个月，这一数字远远高于最近经济衰退中的比率。由于有如此多的人受到当前经济状况的影响，这个项目调查了长期失业的个人情况，以及关于其他人失业的信息，是否减少了人们对美国政治中一个核心价值观--个人主义--的信念的支持率，这种信念是“人们应该通过自己的努力工作取得成功”(Feldman，1988)。这项研究的更广泛的影响是创建一个数据集，供有兴趣研究重大个人经历--失业--对政治态度的影响的学者使用。

The focus of this study is the effect of personal experience on core values. Core values are thought to provide a stable foundation that strongly influences people's attitudes on public policy. Values, such as individualism and equality, are thought to be determined early in life and remain relatively resistant to change. Yet an important question concerns whether people's values change when their personal experiences challenge beliefs at the heart of these values. The intellectual merit of this project focuses on the argument that common experiences that affect many people in a significant way can influence people's core beliefs and the values that derive from those beliefs. The recent recession is the longest since the Great Depression, and the high unemployment rate is accompanied by a high proportion of people who have been unemployed for more than six months. In April 2010, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that over 48.1% of the unemployed have been out of work for more than six months, a figure significantly greater than the rates in recent recessions. With so many people affected by the current economic conditions, this project examines whether the personal circumstances of long-term unemployment, combined with information about other's unemployment, have reduced support for people's belief in one central core value in American politics, individualism, "the belief that people should get ahead on their own hard work" (Feldman, 1988). The broader impact of this study is to create a dataset that would be available to scholars interested in studying the impact of a significant personal experience, unemployment, on political attitudes.